Yesterday I felt my first earthquake. Ever. I didn’t really know what it was. I was sitting at the computer and Bella was in the room with me. I felt the floor moving under me like the dogs were running through the house at full speed, only they weren’t. I turned around to see what Bella was doing and at that moment I got a chat message from Rick saying ‘Earthquake!’ He typed that his building down in Wayne was rocking and rolling pretty good. I quickly looked up on the Weather Underground sight and they were not showing any earthquake activity locally so I clicked on USGS.gov. We do have an old fault line close by, the Ramapo, and I thought it might have originated there but instead it was showing a big red block in Virginia. Virginia? That can’t be right! But it was. 5.9.
I guess because it’s a different kind of fault system than they have in California it was felt more far-ranging. Even people in Cleveland, Ohio were shaken up. Our system is shallow, so it was kind of like dropping a small stone in a big pond and watching the ripples fan out rather than being deep and more centered. I think it’s a good thing since it lessens any damage that way. Still, it was all that was on the news all afternoon. I’m sure the people in California think we are a bunch of weanies here in the East, but we aren’t used to that!
I have a friend who lives very close to the epicenter of the quake (Charlottesville) and I immediately emailed her to see if all was okay. It was, but she said it seemed like the shaking went on forever. Everything in her house was rattling and she said “it sounded like a plastic garbage can rolling around on a cement floor.”
Such excitement!
And waiting in the wings to take the stage for the next nature performance we have Hurricane Irene. It would seem she doesn’t have us directly in her sights, but close enough to make us wonder what the weather on Sunday is going to be like. Sheesh. Maybe she will turn out to be nothing or maybe she will surprise us like the quake did. We just have to wait and see!
In the meantime maybe we should be making offerings to appease the nature gods!
Photo taken at the Botanical Gardens on Monday. It seemed to fit with this post perfectly!
Where oh where did the summer go? I know it’s only the middle of August, and summer isn’t quite over yet but it seems as if it is.The summer has flown by and I’m not quite sure where it went. Maybe it was because Rick was traveling so much at the beginning which made it feel like we had less time than usual for taking rides in Mia and lazy days around the pool.
When I was in grade school it seemed as if the summer stretched out forever. Those few months seemed like years. Or at least looking back on it now it seems that way. It’s true, you know, what they say: the older you get the faster time goes by. Is it because we are more aware of the passage of time than we were as children?
It’s been hotter and more humid this year. And certainly buggier. Lots of little annoying midgey-type black bugs that hover around your eyes, nose and mouth. They don’t bite, thank goodness, but they are a nuisance. We don’t normally have a lot of mosquitoes either, but they’ve been more numerous too. Not nice!
It’s this time of year when the weather starts to change. Right now we are having a lovely cool morning, low humidity and a gentle breeze. For the first time in weeks I have the windows open and the air conditioning turned to OFF. We will still have another round of heat, (we always do), kind of like summer’s last hurrah, but you can tell the summer is winding down. We lose the pool around this time of year too, especially for night swims.
But we aren’t quite done yet. There is still the annual trip down the shore, a visit from friend Carolyn, and the Renaissance Faire (don thy corset, Lynne!) all left to look forward to.
I have to say that summer is not my favorite season so I am not too sad about letting it go. But still ...
This is Thomas. Thomas is a turkey and named with the utmost originality. He is a tom turkey. Get it?
We have many turkeys that visit but Thomas always comes on his own. He usually arrives in the morning just as I am sitting at the computer with cup of coffee checking email. He stands there and stares at the house. Sometimes he even comes up closer to the window to catch my attention as if to say helloooooo! i’m here for my breakfast! And, it works. I get my bucket and put a few scoops of cracked corn and bird seed mix and head out the door.
Thomas trusts me and stands and waits for me to scatter the food. I tap the bucket lightly as a signal he’s going to be fed. He waits patiently. Sometimes he starts eating with me still standing there and sometimes he waits until I leave.
Now I am not saying that I have trained Thomas the Turkey because no wild animal can be tamed, but Thomas has learned over time that tapping the bucket means food. The other turkeys know that signal too and sometimes even when not one turkey is in sight and I tap the bucket, I get a swarm of them coming out of the woods running towards me. It is a sight for sure to see all 13 babies and three or four adults heading right for me! They are smart birds.
Lately our little group has included a few toms, one that is quite large. I didn’t know that toms could be persuaded to be babysitters, but just look at this proof.
They are fun to have around except for when they make their way into the back yard and I unknowingly let the dogs out. The dogs love to chase the turkeys and the poor things squawk and gobble their way out of harm’s way, either by flying into the trees or taking off over the fence. Hailey can sit for hours under a tree with a turkey sitting in it. They amuse everyone in our household.
Last Saturday we drove into the city for the Chinatown Food & Culture Tour. This makes the third tour that we have taken with Foods of New York Tours. We did the Greenwich Village tour last year around this same time, and when my sister was here visiting in June we did the Chelsea Market tour. This time we invited neighbor Kim’s mom, Bea, to join us as she loves Chinese food and Kim does not! Of course, it was one of the hottest days in the heat wave that we’d been having.
We left early since our tickets said they did not recommend driving because the area was very busy and congested. It took us exactly one hour from our door to pulling into the parking garage. So much for leaving plenty of time! I think going on a Saturday was helpful because we encountered no problems.
Right from the start it was obvious we were in Chinatown. Everything was in Chinese! Of course it was in English as well, but the English was very tiny.
We were to meet our guide in Chatham Square (now also known as Kimlau Square) which turned out to be a short walk from our parking garage. It’s a very busy intersection with roads branching off from every aspect.
This statue of Lin Zexu stands in the square.
photo by Rick
Our first stop was Dim Sum Go Go just off the square.
At first look it appeared to be a fast food place as the name sort of implies. When I walked up to the window to look at the menu I saw lots of Michelin awards—one from every year for excellence. Once inside our guide directed upstairs to a large table overlooking the street and square. Air conditioning, yes!
I didn’t know that literally translated Dim Sum means “from the heart.” I also didn’t know that the first Dim Sum were created as a packet to hold medicinal remedies by a village doctor as an easy way to dispense medication to the sick. It later became popular in tea houses as a way to serve food to bring more people in.
Here was our first round: steamed Dim Sum. The white one that is crimped on top like a clutch purse is a duck dumpling; the pink one is a chicken dumpling (and my favorite of this group!); the round white one was a chive and shrimp dumpling and eaten last as a palette cleanser—very fresh and bright.
Are they not tiny works of art? Everything here is made to order. Nothing is ever frozen.
Our second round was a fried pork dumpling (in the back) and the very delicious steamed roast pork bun (the very white one). Yummy! (The dumpling in front half eaten is my chive and shrimp from the last round. I was slow eating.) Our guide described the wrapper for the roast pork bun as being a kind of extremely dense Wonder bread, so it was not a dough like the others were.
After this I was pretty full but I knew there was quite a bit more food to come. From here we did a short walking tour to help digest our food.
Chinatown was apparently a very seedy area of town at one time. Gang wars, opium dens, bordellos, gaming dens, saloons, etc. Doyers Street was famous for gang wars because of it’s abrupt turn. Anyone hiding around the bend could not be seen from the street creating a great place for an ambush. I love the streetlights here—they are shaped like lanterns.
There are also lots of underground tunnels in this part of town, now most of them blocked off and unused, that were used as quick and dirty exits from all the nefarious activities that once took place. We went down in one that is now taken over by businesses and shops in what is pretty cheap real estate.
Nom Wah Tea Parlor has been around since the 1920’s. Our guide told us that Woody Allen loves to come here every Wednesday.
We also learned that not everything is as it appears to be in Chinatown. This “restaurant,” The Gold Flower, is right next door to the tea parlor. However, it is not a restaurant at all. Behind those doors lies one of the trendiest bars in New York City: Apotheke!
According to our guide who has been there, all the staff members wear white lab coats and they claim to “serve prescriptions daily.” Prescriptions in this case being cocktails to match the mood you want to be in. The drink menu is creative and varied and the cocktails are listed under these categories: Health & Beauty, Stimulants, Stress Relievers, Pain Killers, Aphrodisiacs, Pharmaceuticals, Euphoric Enhancers, Therapeutic Treatments and House Remedies. Sounds like a fun time to me!
Another building masquerading as something it is not is this one at 37 Mott Street, “Mei Dick Barber Shop.” Don’t go here to get your hair cut. This is really a poker den.
Our next stop was Elite Health Products, a shop selling all kinds of Chinese herbs, teas, and a colorful array of all things ceramic for tea. There were many strange things in large clear glass jars. Abalone, dried sea cucumbers, swallow nest, ginseng from Wisconsin (of all places). It turns out that Wisconsin has better ginseng than China does! Imagine that!
Now that we had digested our dim sum we were ready for our next food stop:
Once we were seated in this lovely little restaurant our guide proceeded to tell us the behind the scenes story of how they prepare the duck from start to finish. I won’t go into the whole thing here, but I was unaware of all the special preparation that went into making Peking Duck, Peking Duck. The quick and dirty explanation is: “First, air is first pumped into the duck to stretch and loosen the skin, and then boiled water is repeatedly spread over the bird, which is then carefully dried. The dried skin is rubbed all over with maltose and the duck is then roasted in a hot oven for a period of time until the meat is tender and the skin crispy.” I think there is a lot of controversy about how the birds are raised, like there is with foie gras. If you want to know more about what happens before it arrives at your table looking like the photo below of ours, follow this link.
Don’t be put off by the head and neck still being on the bird. As it turns out there was some sort of law in New York years ago that fowl could not be frozen with the head on, so leaving the head and neck on the bird was one way to prove your bird was fresh. The law is no longer in place but the tradition goes on.
It was carved table-side. First the crispy prized skin, then the meat.
He then folded the duck (crispy skin on top) along with cucumbers, scallions and a hoisin-based sauce into homemade pancakes. Delicious! I am getting hungry just telling you about it!
Then it was a walk around the streets to just look and observe.
Next stop was the ABC Restaurant where once again we sat down in a lovely air-conditioned dining room and more delicious food: a traditional Cantonese Roasted Eggplant dish and the yummiest fried rice I have ever had. By this time I was getting very full and wishing I could have eaten more but space was limited!
We sampled some iced plum tea at Ten Ren’s Tea Time and browsed the tea selection. Some were very pricey!
Our one and only sidewalk tasting was dessert. While our guide Burt ran across the road to Hon Cafe to pick up our Tiger Roll, we stayed in the shade under the awning of Ten Ren’s.
And so, with the consumption of our final tasting, our delightful tour of Chinatown was complete.
I hope I’ve inspired you to visit on your own or take the tour yourselves some day! I know we are going back very soon!
